During the early 1990s we started investigating the two controversial taurodont molars that were discovered at Għar Dalam in 1917, and that were identified by the brilliant anatomist, Sir Arthur Keith, as belonging to Neanderthal Man.
However, these molars were relegated to the Neolithic during the ‘Prehistoric Survey of the Maltese Islands’ that took off in 1951; a Nitrogen test had allegedly been carried out that was able to confirm the new dating.
After undertaking research during the mid-1990s at the Museums of Natural History of Malta and London, where the original documentation of the laboratory tests on the molars were organised and documented, in the ‘Bone Analyses Catalogue’, certain discrepancies started to emerge that caused serious concern, until a stage was reached when a case could be made for tampering with evidence, leading to false results and a gross misrepresentation of the true age of the Għar Dalam molars.
In 1997 we co-authored ‘Dossier Malta – evidence for the Magdalenian’ that sought to uncover these unorthodox dealings that were carried out during the 1950s in order to discredit the Għar Dalam molars, at the same time compiling evidence from various other disciplines to support a Palaeolithic presence on Malta, these other disciplines including Palaeolithic art and archaeogenetics.
The controversy was ventilated on the tabloids over a period of several months, with the Mifsuds on one side and the osteo-pathologist Dr John Samut-Tagliaferro on the other; the debate included a conference held at the University of Malta. It was concluded by the Professor of Archaeology through an article that supported the Mifsuds and their hypothesis for a Palaeolithic Maltese presence.
Early on in 2016 we elicited further support through a confirmation of our thesis from the top-notch palaeo-anthropologists of the day, professors Shara Bailey and Aida Gomez-Robles from North America, and Timothy Compton at the Museum of Natural History in London, all specialists in the Neanderthal dentition, who unambiguously confirmed their Neanderthal identification of the 1917 Għar Dalam molars.
On June 7, 2016, one of these palaeoanthropologists, Prof. Aida Gómez-Robles – a world-renowned expert in Neanderthal dentition – alerted Heritage Malta to something extraordinary: the teeth excavated from Għar Dalam nearly a century earlier showed unequivocal Neanderthal traits. Her team offered to travel, analyse the material, and potentially rewrite Malta’s prehistoric narrative – all at no cost.
We’re talking tangible remains sitting in a Maltese museum, gathering dust, while other nations seize scientific leadership with less
Malta’s official response? Deafening silence!
At the same time, Prof. Svante Paabo, also a world-renowned expert in the Neanderthal genome, strongly advised Heritage Malta to have the same two molars tested for ancient DNA (aDNA) at his state-of-the-art laboratory in Leipzig, at no cost to the Maltese government. The outcome? Heritage Malta opted to carry out this test themselves. The result? No results so far!
This isn’t academic quibbling. This is a country potentially sitting on the earliest evidence of human habitation in the Central Mediterranean and choosing to look away. We’re not talking theory – we’re talking tangible remains sitting in a Maltese museum, gathering dust, while other nations seize scientific leadership with less.
Why ignore it? Fear of disruption? Institutional comfort? An unwillingness to admit that our “official” prehistory might be incomplete – or worse, wrong?
Two neglected teeth lying in storage in a museum were about to alter the prehistory of Malta in a dramatic manner. However, there was an amount of collateral damage involved with the exposure of the individuals involved in the unorthodox proceedings, and a decision was taken by the authorities concerned to prioritise the good name of the museums in favour of the truth.
By refusing to act on Gómez-Robles’s and Paabo’s proposals, Malta has missed the chance to collaborate with world-class researchers, attract international funding, and lead global conversations about early human migration. Instead, we have a national institution behaving more like a gatekeeper than a steward.
Let’s be clear: neglecting this line of inquiry doesn’t preserve our heritage –it stifles it. We owe it to ourselves, and to future generations, to pursue every credible lead about our past. That means digging deeper – not just into the soil of Għar Dalam, but into the systems that allow this level of intellectual paralysis.
Silence is no longer defensible. It’s time to listen to the teeth.
Anton Mifsud is a consultant paediatrician and co-author of pioneering research on prehistoric Maltese human remains, notably the Neanderthal molars from Għar Dalam.
Simon Mifsud is a paediatric consultant and archaeological researcher who co-led investigations into Malta’s Palaeolithic heritage and ancient dentition studies.
